| Popis: |
Background: Pathological anxiety is among the major mental health issues in adolescence. It is well-documented that, working memory, a core cognitive function, is often disrupted in anxiety. However, the underpinning mechanisms for the working memory deficits in adolescent anxiety remain elusive. Methods: We used the classical delay-estimation task to assess the visual working memory (VWM) performance of adolescents with anxiety disorder (N = 39) versus and health controls (N = 41). Taking a computational psychiatry approach, we tested 14 models established in basic research of VWM. Results: Model comparison results identified the variable-precision model as the best-fitting model for both groups, indicating that the two groups share a qualitatively similar process in completing the task. Subsequent analyses of the parameter estimates pointed to atypically reduced memory resources as the major determinant of the impaired behavioral performance in adolescents with anxiety disorder. Crucially, estimated memory resource value was significantly associated with the severity of anxiety symptoms. Conclusions: Using state-of-the-art computational modeling, our results reveal that deficits in memory sources may be a key factor in adolescent anxiety, which can be a behavioral marker for future clinical interventions. The current study also highlights the use of computational approaches in dissecting the hidden mechanisms of psychiatric conditions. |
